Showing posts with label opinion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label opinion. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 9, 2025

ICYMI: Rep. Auchincloss ‘By Invitation’ in The Economist: “A congressman on how Democrats can regain the initiative on the economy”

In a recent guest essay for The Economist, Congressman Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) outlined a new framework for Democrats to reclaim voters' trust on the economy by treating cost disease—the economic phenomenon where prices in key sectors rise faster than wages year over year. Cost disease explains why rent and healthcare costs consume so much of Americans' wallets, and why that share keeps rising. Rep. Auchincloss sets out how treating cost disease, particularly in housing and healthcare, must be core to the Democrats' agenda for financial freedom. 

Please find below Rep. Auchincloss's op-ed:

"Cost disease is also known as the Baumol effect. It helps explain why rent and health care consume so much of Americans' wallets—and why, in the case of health care, the share keeps rising. William Baumol, an American economist, showed in the 1960s that inflation is not evenly spread across the economy. Service industries with low productivity growth inflate fast. Manufactured goods and automated services deflate prices.

The Baumol effect is both esoteric and everywhere. Housing and health care are prime examples: together they consume half of a typical middle-class family's income in America. Families wondering why their rent and health-insurance premiums are going up faster than their take-home pay are asking the question that Baumol helped to answer.

Three decades before Baumol described the problem, Theodore Wright, an American engineer, had found the cure for cost disease. Wright's law observed that cost per unit goes down as more units are produced. Want a service to be affordable? Turn the service into a product. Then, manufacture the product at scale to lower the cost per unit. New manufacturing jobs will not be taken from other countries through tariffs. They will be created from services, by turning them into products.

Rep. Auchincloss ‘By Invitation’ in The Economist
Rep. Auchincloss ‘By Invitation’ in The Economist

Take computers. A century ago, a "computer" was a person. Sitting side-by-side, hundreds of individuals scribbled out algorithms. It was an expensive service. Then a "computer" became a product. It was a machine as big as a room. That first product was expensive, too. But then computer manufacturing took off, and cost per unit fell. Today, computing is cheap. It was cured of cost disease.

Mass production requires consistent standards. Production is an act of learning. To compete, factory managers learn how to produce more with less. This learning under competition delivers Wright's law: that cost per unit falls as production increases. When product specifications change unpredictably, though, much of the learning on the factory line has to reset. Costs go up, not down.

Democratic states and cities have been changing and adding specifications (for multi-family housing, for instance) for decades, through regulations. Frustrated by the resulting high costs, politicians then send out money to constituents (in the form of, say, housing vouchers). In the short term this does help them muddle through. In the long term, though, cost disease is inflamed by this cycle of regulations that restrict supply and then subsidies that increase demand.

To lower costs, America needs to build a lot, fast, the same way. Housing should be the priority for mass production. Americans may perceive housing as a product—something you buy and own—but most of it is a service. It is constructed, not manufactured, and construction is labour-intensive, with low productivity growth. Since the 1960s, in fact, construction productivity has actually gone down. Manufacturing productivity, by contrast, has risen by more than 500%. Manufacturing more of America's housing could help deliver the 7m extra homes that the country needs, quickly and cost-effectively. Just like with computing, turning house-building from a service into a product would cure it of cost disease.

The government can help with both permitting and financing. For example, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) could issue an advanced commitment for thousands of manufactured housing units. Fannie Mae, a government-sponsored mortgage giant, could be used to finance this at low interest rates. HUD specifications could be made the national standard for building permits. And any city accepting federal low-income housing tax credits could be required to adopt not just that permitting, but denser zoning too.

When Austin, Texas adopted land-use reforms of this sort, apartment construction boomed and rents plunged. Cambridge, Massachusetts has followed suit. Those who doubt that Democrats can think differently on regulations, take note of Cambridge: a city where Kamala Harris won 86% of the vote adopted a new zoning law in which three-quarters of the text was to do with deleting old rules.

Health care is a more traditional Democratic issue. Democrats earned Americans' trust on health care by expanding coverage. Now, we must lower its cost.

There are two ways to treat cost disease in health care. The first is more conventional: turn custom services into mass-produced goods. Generic drugs, therapy bots and over-the-counter hearing aids are examples. Each affordable product meets a need that was previously addressed through expensive clinical services. Democrats should accelerate this service-to-product pipeline, which will require taking on various special interests within the health-care system.

The other way to reduce health costs is to deflect patients from the most expensive sites of care. In America, those sites are generally intensive-care units, emergency rooms, nursing facilities and jails. Interventions that reduce demand for beds at those sites help treat cost disease. Examples include lowering co-pays (deductibles) for prescription drugs, promoting telehealth for the old, expanding community health centres' footprint and taxing sugary beverages.

Health-insurance executives are likely to object that they do this already through their plans—or so they claim to Congress. Yet health-insurance premiums keep rising faster than inflation. Democrats should square off against the big insurers and show that we can lower costs where they will not.

The policies above, from housing to health care, are diverse. Yet they are not hard to communicate if brought together in the frame of the Baumol effect. Few Americans may know Baumol, but they are familiar with the feeling of prices rising faster than their pay. Republicans are making it worse with their chaotic tariffs. Democrats can make it better by treating cost disease." 

Sunday, August 28, 2022

Auchincloss Op Ed: Afghanistan can be stabilized and America's first step should be with mining

As we mark the one year anniversary of the troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, please see the below oped from Congressman Auchincloss. Congressman Auchincloss commanded infantry in Afghanistan and special operations in Panama. In Afghanistan in 2012, he led patrols through villages contested by the Taliban. In Panama as part of the Marines' elite reconnaissance branch, his team trained local units to stop the drug trade. He's now a major in the reserves.

Key Point:
"Without boots on the ground, we have more resources to counter Russia and China, while maintaining the capability to take terrorists off the battlefield. Afghanistan, though, is struggling. But there is a path forward that helps the Afghan people while further strengthening America. Western mining can do what Western militaries never could: put Afghanistan on the path of self-sufficiency. Afghanistan has vast mineral wealth. Mining could bootstrap economic development for the Afghan people. It could also secure for the United States the raw materials necessary to boost semiconductor and clean energy production, as intended by the blockbuster Chips and Science Act and Inflation Reduction Act....The American people owe this support to the Afghan people as we work to stabilize the region. Our greatest gift, though, will not be assistance, but economic empowerment. Mining is the first step."  

FOX: Afghanistan can be stabilized and America's first step should be with mining

By: Congressman Jake Auchincloss 

America can use mining partnership in Afghanistan to force human rights improvements

One year after ending the failed war in Afghanistan, the United States is in a stronger position. Without boots on the ground, we have more resources to counter Russia and China, while maintaining the capability to take terrorists off the battlefield. Afghanistan, though, is struggling. But there is a path forward that helps the Afghan people while further strengthening America.

Western mining can do what Western militaries never could: put Afghanistan on the path of self-sufficiency. Afghanistan has vast mineral wealth. Mining could bootstrap economic development for the Afghan people. It could also secure for the United States the raw materials necessary to boost semiconductor and clean energy production, as intended by the blockbuster Chips and Science Act and Inflation Reduction Act.

We can't delay. Days after the United States left, the Chinese Communist Party started ramping up its decade-long designs on Afghanistan's $1 trillion of mineral deposits. The Chinese see 20 years and $2 trillion of American blood, sweat, and treasure as the groundwork for their own extractive industries. Their designs include a tenuous contract with the Afghans to mine copper at Mes Aynak, near Kabul.

The Chinese offered a power plant and a railroad as part of the contract. They work well with the Taliban's allies in Pakistan. And, they do not hold the Taliban to account for its human-rights abuses and drug trade.

There is an opening for the United States, though. The Chinese are not delivering economic development. They reneged on building the railroad. They also balk at establishing copper processing on site. Instead, they want to transport the raw ore out of the country, preventing Afghan industry from climbing the next rung of the value chain. The Taliban's Minister of Mines and Petroleum is reported to prefer American to Chinese miners; this year, he had a virtual meeting with a few American companies, inviting them to invest in Afghanistan.  

The United States and its Western allies should take him up on the offer, with strict conditions. The agreement could start with copper mining at Mes Aynak, a direct rebuttal to the Chinese. Cooperation might then expand to sites with lithium, iron, rare earth elements, gold, lapis lazulis, and other in-demand minerals or gems. Also, possible: oil and gas production in northern Afghanistan, where the China National Petroleum Corporation seeks to restart operations in the Amu Darya Basin, but where U.S. companies are also well-positioned.

In exchange for Western investment in the mineral extraction and processing, power generation, transportation, and workforce development necessary to build an Afghan mining industry from scratch, U.S. diplomats must require the Taliban to partner with one or several multilateral development banks (MLB), such as the Asian Development Bank or the U.S. Development Finance Corporation. The MLB would draft and enforce the contracts, especially royalty rates. It would also work to ensure that mining revenues support social and economic development, not narco-terror cabals. Funding should be a public-private partnership; unfrozen Afghan central bank funds and global aid could be first dollars in, starting with a feasibility study, to de-risk companies' long-term investments.

The challenges in this project are immense. The Taliban might lie, cheat, and steal. China and Pakistan might obstruct. Mining companies might drag their feet. But, we must do something to change the status quo. The Afghan economy runs on opium and meth. The only near-term alternative to drugs is minerals. So, let's try it. As a first step, I have a bill in Congress to direct the State Department to study a Special Economic Zone in Afghanistan for mining.

This project is also not an excuse for inaction on immediate crises. The United States, already the world's largest humanitarian donor to Afghanistan, must do more to improve food security, especially for children. To honor our commitment to allies, the administration should expand Operation Allies Welcome and Congress must pass the Afghan Adjustment Act. And, we must use every point of leverage to change the Taliban's most egregious behavior, particularly regarding the rights of women and girls and the release of Mark Frerichs.

The American people owe this support to the Afghan people as we work to stabilize the region. Our greatest gift, though, will not be assistance, but economic empowerment. Mining is the first step.  

Jake Auchincloss represents the Massachusetts Fourth Congressional District in Congress where he is Vice Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.


Auchincloss Oped: Afghanistan can be stabilized and America's first step should be with mining
Auchincloss Oped: Afghanistan can be stabilized and America's first step should be with mining


Thursday, March 25, 2021

MA voices on National News: another mass shooting prompts more talk, no action (yet)

"Baker supports federal assault weapons ban, would advocate Mass.-style gun laws to national GOP"

"Governor Charlie Baker said Wednesday that he supports a federal ban on assault weapons and that he would advocate Massachusetts-style gun laws to fellow Republicans in Congress, as Democrats in Washington renew the push for tighter restrictions following two mass shootings in the last week.

“I think what we’ve done here in Massachusetts has worked and worked well, and if I could be a voice to share that with folks at the national level, I’d be happy to do that,” Baker said in an interview with Jim Braude and Margery Eagan on GBH Radio’s “Boston Public Radio.”

Asked by Braude if he supports a federal assault weapons ban, Baker responded, “Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.”


 
"If 20 children killed in an elementary school didn’t change things, why would 10 dead adults in a supermarket?"

It doesn’t matter what most Americans want. It doesn’t matter how many people die. Those who could protect us from you too often won’t


Thursday, November 26, 2020

"Perhaps the path to healing begins with three simple words: Are you OK?"

By

Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)

Monday, September 21, 2020

Boston Globe: "Why ranked choice is the wrong choice"

From the Boston Globe, an article of interest for Franklin: 
"Though ranked-choice voting has been bruited about for years as a way to improve elections, I never wrote about it because the debate always seemed so abstract. It’s not abstract anymore. Question 2 on the Massachusetts ballot would implement ranked-choice statewide beginning in 2022. If the initiative passes, elections in Massachusetts will change dramatically.

It won’t be a change for the better.

Proponents of ranked-choice voting argue that the current system, in which the candidate getting the most votes wins the election, is unfair. In a two-candidate race, the winner always receives a majority of the votes, but when three or more candidates are on the ballot, it takes only a plurality, not an outright majority, to win. Ranked-choice advocates call that unjust. “Democracy is supposed to be majority rules,” says Evan Falchuk, who ran for governor in 2014 as an independent and now chairs the Yes on 2 Committee. “We should have a system where the majority wins.”

But by definition, ranked-choice voting only applies to elections in which there isn’t a majority winner. On a ranked-choice ballot, voters can list candidates in order of preference, rather than vote for just the candidate they like best. If no candidate gets more than half of the first-place votes, ranked-choice rules trigger a series of automatic do-overs, repeatedly reallocating votes that went to the least popular candidate until an artificial “majority” is created for one of the remaining candidates. Question 2 thus gives some voters multiple bites of the election apple. At the same time, it effectively disenfranchises other voters — those who don’t rank enough candidates for their ballot to last through multiple rounds of tabulation."
Continue reading the article online (subscription may be required)
 
For information on the ballot questions and other items for the November election, visit the "Election Collection"  https://www.franklinmatters.org/2020/08/2020-election-collection.html

Boston Globe: "Why ranked choice is the wrong choice"
Boston Globe: "Why ranked choice is the wrong choice"


Sunday, September 14, 2014

"How not to be ignorant about the world"

The TED Talk by Hans and Ola Rosling has a provocative title. It may be just me but I would have said "How to better informed about the world." And maybe that is why I am doing what I do and not presenting something like this.

Regular readers know that what we are about here at Franklin Matters is sharing information and creating a fact-based understanding about what is happening in Franklin. We focus on the business side of things but do spend time in related matters.

At one point in the talk Hans says:
"You see, the problem is not that people don't read and listen to the media. The problem is that the media doesn't know themselves."
What we do here is not 'traditional media'. I use "we" deliberately. You contribute as much to this site as I do. Your questions, your information, your corrections all help to drive what is shared here. It may be my name on most of the regular posts. It may be Renata's name on the weekly summary of events. But is is YOU behind the scenes feeding us the info and questions.

Towards the end of the talk Ola (Hans' son) says:
"If you have a fact-based worldview of today, you might have a chance to understand what's coming next in the future."
Thank you! Please continue to read, comment, share and ask question. Together we can become more informed about Franklin or as Hans would say "not ignorant!"

The video runs about 18 minutes so settle in and enjoy!





You can find this Ted Talk on the official Ted page here
http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_and_ola_rosling_how_not_to_be_ignorant_about_the_world/transcript?language=en

Other TED Talks by Hans Rosling can be found on his profile page
http://www.ted.com/speakers/hans_rosling

Hans Rosling - TED bio page
Hans Rosling - TED bio page


Note: as mentioned previously, if someone has interest to follow and report on Franklin committee meetings, feel free to reach out to me. I can help you with the technical details.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

engage the Franklin voters

I'll have more later this week but my first reactions to the election results are

It is a sad day for Franklin when so few registered voters do exercise their right to vote. There are no excuses for weather problems, absentee ballots were available in advance. Only 16.4% of 19,780 voters bothered to cast a vote. Less than the two prior off year elections. The trend (if there is one) is going the wrong way.

It was good to see the energy of some of the newcomers to the Council race; Tina Powderly and Glenn Jones in particular. Glenn was observed on the triangle over the railroad bridge holding his sign in the rain on Sat Oct 24th and then again early Sun morning, Nov 1. Tina garnered the largest vote amongst the Council candidates.

The Brick School remains a significant factor in Franklin and although closed is still important. The results for Matt Kelly and Cynthia Douglas show this. Cindy running in her first election took in the top number of votes from all candidates. Teaching at the Brick School, over 30 years of good service, 20 or so kids at a time builds up relationships. Relationships that turned out to vote.

That newcomers garnered some of the larger totals seems to validate the message Ashley Studley, Milford Daily News reporter, was picking up from the voters leaving the field house. The attempt to vote out the incumbents ultimately failed as all were re-elected albeit some were by slim margins.

The problems of Franklin remain the same after election. They didn't just disappear because someone didn't vote for an incumbent. The challenge is clearly in the Town Council's hands now to come together and engage the Franklin voters/tax payers in such a way that our issues can be responsibly discussed and then worked to a solution.